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View synonyms for Don Quixote

Don Quixote

[ don kee-hoh-tee, don kwik-suht; Spanish dawn kee-haw-te ]

noun

  1. the hero of a novel by Cervantes who was inspired by lofty and chivalrous but impractical ideals.
  2. (italics) ( Don Quixote de la Mancha ) the novel itself (1605 and 1615).


Don Quixote

/ don kiˈxote; ˈkwɪksət; ˈdɒn kiːˈhəʊtiː /

noun

  1. an impractical idealist


Don Quixote

  1. (1605–1615) A novel by Miguel de Cervantes . The hero, Don Quixote ( don is a Spanish title of honor), loses his wits from reading too many romances and comes to believe that he is a knight destined to revive the golden age of chivalry . A tall, gaunt man in armor, he has many comical adventures with his fat squire, Sancho Panza .


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Notes

A person who is both idealistic and impractical is often said to be “quixotic.”

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Word History and Origins

Origin of Don Quixote1

after the hero of Cervantes' Don Quixote de la Mancha

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Example Sentences

She reportedly also had a book collection worth more than €20 million, including a first edition of Don Quixote from 1605.

They portrayed the Secretary as a kind of well-meaning but naïve Don Quixote flailing vainly against windmills.

He had gone on to such projects as a 28-foot marionette for the 1965 Balanchine production of Don Quixote.

When he dreams his own impossible dream, Jack Abramoff is not so much Don Quixote as Don Corleone.

At an orchestral rehearsal, held specially for him, he conducted his new Don Quixote Fantasia.

Don Quixote was always doing generous but rather foolish things, and the adjective quixotic now describes this sort of action.

Michael was now in a perplexity for literary recreation, until he remembered Don Quixote.

I tried it; but, in the spirit of Don Quixote with his helmet, I did not try it hard.

But he will not fight the windmills of Spain on an old mule like Don Quixote.

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